Julia Voss
The Pantagraph
Military gives police free equipment
EUREKA, Ill. — Officers from the Woodford County Sheriff’s Department and 10 other communities have access to an armored police rescue vehicle.
The bulletproof, 17,000-pound vehicle cost $220,000. It was paid for with federal money shared after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks to help communities prepare themselves for potential attacks. Springfield and Champaign have similar vehicles.
Illinois used the money to create 10 regional weapons of mass destruction special response teams.
“We’re the only state in the country that did that,” said Lt. James Pierson, tactical commander of the Central Illinois Emergency Response Team and Illinois Law Enforcement Alarm System.
“Part of the caveat for attracting these (tactical) teams to be part of the ILEAS team was to say, any equipment that (the federal government) gives ILEAS, you can use for your local team as well,” said Pierson.
Every agency that is part of the Central Illinois Emergency Response Team has access to ILEAS equipment, which includes the police rescue vehicle. CIERT joined ILEAS in March 2006.
CIERT has officers from departments in Bloomington, Pontiac, Taylorville, Macomb, Canton and Havana. The Peoria County Sheriff’s Department is the host agency for the CIERT and ILEAS teams.
“This is just a small part of the equipment that we’ve received,” said Pierson. “They’ve probably spent $1 million on this team alone.”
CIERT also has access to a Ford Excursion and a 30-foot trailer to haul equipment. The police rescue vehicle will be kept in Peoria County with the rest of the CIERT equipment.
The police rescue vehicle has a diesel engine and is built on a Ford chassis. It can be safely driven up to speeds of about 65 miles per hour.
An interior radiation detector can identify levels of gamma radiation. A combustible gas reader sounds an alarm if team members enter an unsafe area.
Because of the cost, the vehicle “is something none of the counties would be able to have on their own,” said Woodford County Sheriff Jim Piercall. “It takes the cooperation of multiple agencies to have something like this.”
The vehicle creates a safer operating environment for officers in emergency aid or hostage situations.
Woodford County Deputy Marshall Smith was involved in an incident in Bartonville last December when the vehicle was deployed.
“That’s the big thing in an ‘officer down’ rescue where there is an active shooter involved,” said Smith. “With this vehicle, we could drive right into that situation, pull up, put the wounded citizen in the vehicle and drive out of the hot zone safely. It’s the only vehicle in the area that could be used like that.”
Copyright 2007 The Pantagraph